Our Feelings Are Our Gods
by Hope Shalott
Summary: A collection of one shots featuring Jasper Hale and Leah Clearwater.
1. Dead Leaves

**Disclaimer: **Characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. Story is produced without profit.

**Characters: **Leah/Jasper

**Status: **Completed one shot

**Rating: **K

**Warnings: -**

**Inspirations: ** -

**Summary: **He wants her but he'll never tell. She's too precious, too new for an old soul like him.

…_..._

_**Dead Leaves**_

…_..._

Her eyes are deep. Soulful pools of brown and never ending depths. He would probably fall right in if he could bear to see the pain in them for more than two seconds.

He wants her but he'll never tell. She's too precious, too new for an old soul like him. Even if she doesn't know it yet. Never has he felt emotion as strong as hers and he knows she gives all she has. In life, in love, in hate and he wants it more than anyone could imagine. He'd take it all; the good and the bad for just for her to see him as a man and not the monster she believes he is. He knows what it's like to bear scars that most can't see and he wants to tell her that she's still beautiful and strong.

He feels her pain and he dreams of taking it away. He thinks he could. Wrap his arms around her and heal a wounded heart. Cloud her mind with a sedated joy until she closes her eyes and sleeps against him. He could sing her lullabies and stroke her hair. Kiss her eyes while she too far into sleep to notice. She'd never have to know that he dreams of so much more.

She's a broken doll, a fallen angel and for the first time in a long time, he believes in heaven. Not for himself, his soul is far too tainted for that, but there has to something better for her. His mind is working against him. Filling up with images of brown skin and cold lips upon it and he sees Edward's sly glances. He would smile if it didn't hurt so much. How can anyone understand?

He knows the true meaning of regret. He mourns every life he's ended; both good and bad because they will always blacken her view of him. Even if she could care, he will always be a man with blood on his hands. She deserves better than that.

He's swirling cold and borrowed emotion and she's not much more than dead leaves on the ground. Blowing round in every which way, trying desperately to settle. He wants to hold her broken heart in his cold, dead hands and he could fix it if he only had the chance. But he never will. She looks at him and sees death and pain. A thief stealing her life and her love.

Her hatred has smoothed into disgust and before he couldn't have imagined that, so maybe there is hope. Maybe one day she'll notice that he's sorry for taking so much from her and that all he wants now is to give it back.

…...


	2. Ever

**Disclaimer: **Characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. Story is produced without profit. Lyrics by Emilie Autumn.

**Characters: **Leah/Jasper

**Status: **Completed one shot

**Rating: **K

**Warnings: **Angst

**Inspirations: **Ever by Emilie Autumn.

**Summary: "**You were ever in my mind" A realistic view of how Jasper would react to Leah having feelings for him.

…

**Ever**

…

There's never any warning when the world gets tipped upside down. One minute you're on your feet, the next you're floating. Twisting and turning in the air, beaten down by gravity so hard that you can't even think of trying to place your feet.

All with the ability to love, to need...to desire, know this feeling but only those who love alone can truly know how it feels to fall back down to the ground.

Grief can break a heart and anger can turn it to stone but only love can shatter it into a million pieces so that death, for an incomplete soul, becomes a blessing.

She had watched him from across the room so many times, that she could carve his face in the dirt and people would revere it as beautiful. A complete likeness. Had he known her feelings, the look of pity he would have regarded her with would certainly have crushed her soul, had she not been glad of any look from him. Anger, hatred, disgust...she would covet it all only for him to acknowledge her existence.

One look from warm honey eyes and she had fallen over and over again. She could never decide whether her feelings were a gift from heaven or a curse from hell but she had never felt so complete just knowing that she had existed in this world alongside him.

For years she had known him, some had been spent hating his very being. Was it her punishment to need him so quietly and softly and so completely that she could never even whisper her feelings in fear of losing the little part of him she owned?

Friend. And she both hated and loved the word at once.

"Leah," his voice was a melody and her name the greatest word ever uttered until the next he spoke.

He stood in front of her, golden eyes dull with the pity she had both feared and craved to see in them. She was standing in the midst of her only dream. His attention was focused on her, only her, so why did her heart feel so heavy? She felt an impending sense of doom. Nothing good would come of this moment but there was her and there was him and that was enough.

"We have to talk about your...feelings for me."

His words sang in her ears. He knew and she couldn't speak, so enraptured in the terrified excitement worming its way through her. His eyes were heavy and hooded, trying desperately to cover a shadowed disgust that made her want to drop to the floor and stay there until the end of time.

"Alice has noticed. She doesn't worry, she knows I love only her but it's...difficult. For both of us."

She stared at him, confused. She loved him and he didn't love her. What was so difficult about that?

He saw the question in her eyes and his returning look was so gentle and soft that she had to turn away from him.

"I can feel emotions, remember? Alice doesn't know whether she's comforting you or me anymore."

She remained silent. Her throat was too dry to utter a single word. She didn't cry, so afraid that she might never stop if she started. She could cry an ocean of tears for this man.

"I love Alice. She's my wife, my soulmate. She's the only reason I exist. I could never love anyone as much as I do her. I could never be without her."

She turned to him, tears threatening to spill, still moved by the beauty of him standing in the moonlight, despite the pain his words were causing her. It would hurt forever knowing that he was there and she was here but he would never be hers. They would never be two halves of one whole. She would never mean as much to him as he did her.

She knew that she would fade away still loving him. Her hair would turn grey and bronze skin would wither but her feelings would burn as strong until they consumed her. Until she begged for release from them. She would never escape this precious torment. Ever.

_You were ever in my mind  
You were behind my soul each time  
I held it to the flame  
You were ever in my precious thoughts  
I'd leave a room of angels  
Just to be alone  
If only to say your name  
I never told you I needed you darling  
Like a rose needs the rain  
How could you possibly know how much  
So I reach for your love  
Like the moon and the stars  
Ever in my sight  
Ever out of touch_

…...


	3. Let It Be

**Disclaimer: **Characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. Story is produced without profit.

**Characters: **Leah/Jasper

**Status: **Completed one shot

**Rating: **K

**Warnings: **Angst

**Inspirations: **Let it Be by The Beatles but more specifically the Aretha Franklin version.

**Summary: **One shot about knowing what to change and what to let be.

…..

**Let It Be**

…...

It is a cold night. A bitter night and to normal ears, it might be silent. She hears everything, of course. Every chirp and every twitter. She can hear the rustle of heavy boots on dead leaves about a mile away, heading in her direction.

It is her gift to be so connected with the world around her. She can hear a roach scuttling across an empty room, she can hear rats nesting in the walls. She knows that, no matter where she stands, she is never truly alone. The only price she has to pay is a complete lack of peace and the tranquillity that comes with silence. The trade isn't exactly fair but she didn't really have a choice anyway.

"Cold night."

She turns to face the intruder she already knew was coming. "Freezing." she replies simply. They both know neither of them can really feel it. He scuffs his boot on the ground. It's the first time she's seen a leech look nervous and it sparks her own worry.

"I expected this to happen sooner. You always like to know what's going on."

He looks up at her, honey blond hair shimmering in the moonlight. It is only one shade darker than his marble white skin. She has never seen anything so beautiful. "It took me a little while to figure it all out. I didn't think it would be possible."

She snorts and tilts her head to the sky. The stars are out in full force tonight. Shining bright, her destiny weaving between them. Can anyone fight something so big?

"That makes two of us." It's her turn to look nervous now, although she has rehearsed her part a million times already, words forming in her head. The words she wants to say and not the words she needs to. "When did you figure it out?"

"When Alice and I returned with Nahuel. I saw the way you looked at me." His voice catches slightly on his wife's name.

"I was glad you were back."

He nods, and silence falls between them once again. They both watch a doormouse scurry across the ground, right into a bush where they know a hungry fox is waiting. She picks up a rock and throws it, startling both predator and it's prey and it's prey.

"Why didn't you leave it?" he asks. She whips her head towards him. Her eyes are glazed and she smiles dreamily. He knows that this is an affect of him simply being there. There is no hint of the confusion she is feeling in her expression.

"He would have eaten him if I didn't stop it."

He shrugs lazily. It is beyond his ability to feel such compassion for small animals so he focuses his ability and delights in hers. "It's nature. Maybe the mouse was meant to die tonight."

"Or maybe I was meant to stop it. Maybe that's why that rock was right there. Maybe that's why I hit the right bush. What if the things that we think are meant to be, really aren't?"

He doesn't answer because he knows this discussion has gone way beyond mice and foxes, and there are no real answers for what she is asking.

"When was it?" he asks after a long pause. "When did it happen?"

She drops onto a fallen log and he sits beside her. "When I first saw you. You were showing us how to fight the newborns."

"And none of the others knew?"

She shakes her head and black silk drapes over her shoulders. He has the swiftest urge to reach out and touch it. "It wasn't like they say it is. That's probably why I didn't realise it straight away. It was just a niggle, really. I saw you and I felt like I'd known you forever, like you were a part of me...but I hated you because you were a leech. So maybe that helped me to hide it." She looks thoughtful for a moment. "Edward knows. He has to know but he hasn't said anything to me." she adds.

He nods slowly and swallows the lump in his throat. Her admission has simply confirmed everything he already knew. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"You're married."

He breathes a sigh of relief at her words. "You could have pushed it. I might not have been able to refuse." His voice is questioning, prompting.

"You wouldn't have been able to refuse. Because it's meant to be, right? I don't know why it was you. Maybe because I'm a genetic dead end and that fate bitch doesn't want me taking away someone else's one true soulmate, or maybe vampire venom is the only thing on this planet that could possibly knock me up." She falls quiet but he knows she isn't done yet.

"I couldn't do it to her. To you." She whispers her last words. "I know that if you could choose, of your own free will, it wouldn't be me."

He wants to protest because her pain is overwhelming but he can't because it's true. It wouldn't be her. It still isn't her.

"Fifty years of memories. Fifty years of grafting a life together. I couldn't be the person to knock it all down. I couldn't live with myself."

He wants to hug her, kiss her, hold her, because he has met some of the imprint couples and he's not sure that he could have resisted the pull of her emotions, even if he could have denied his own. It's taken him a while to figure out what he wants and that is without her asserting her claim over him. He's eternally grateful that she put Alice first at a time when he couldn't.

"Y'know...even after all of this, even feeling it...I still don't believe it's real. It just seems to easy."

He knows exactly what she means because underneath the pull, there is still the glaring doubt that any of this is right, that any of it is natural.

"It's not just about you and her." There is still a bitterness when she talks of Alice. "This is for me, too. I don't want to be put in love. I want to fall. Otherwise, how can you trust it? How can it be a leap of faith if you're stuck on the ground? And isn't that what love is all about?"

"I think it is," he agrees. "Or at least, that's the best way to do it. And you really do deserve the best, Leah."

"I know," she replies and he laughs at her lack of humility. She's quiet and there is a haunted look in her eyes and a throbbing ache in his gut. "It's not easy. It hurts everyday, and sometimes I do think of trying to convince you, but I won't do it. I promise you that."

The tears start, sliding slowly down her cheeks before she is overcome with emotion. "I love you, and I love Alice because you love Alice. But when I step back from it all...when I think of love, real love, you already have that with her. So why isn't that enough? Why is this better?"

She is echoing questions he has asked himself a thousand times, over and over just for the slightest hint of an answer. They were her questions first, formed when she first realised that everything she had given was not enough and never had been.

"Perhaps it's not better. Maybe realising that is half the battle won."

She nods and swipes at her tears with the back of her hand. "I think it fades a little when I really believe it. If I thought it was right, if I thought it was real, then nothing would stop me, Jasper. If I had chosen you, then I would fight until I dropped dead, or until you dropped dead." she adds as an afterthought and he chuckles at her precision.

"I saved that doormouse because I felt like I had to. Because I was there and maybe it was rushing home to it's babies or something. But you and Alice, you're happy. You've got something good. There's no need for anyone to come between that."

She sighs and looks at the stars with a grimace, before her face shifts into an expression of grim determination. "Sometimes the best way to fight, is to just let it be."

And he puts his arm around her and pulls her into a hug, because he understands. Sometimes doing nothing can be the hardest thing of all.

…...


	4. Melt

**Disclaimer: **Characters belong to Stephenie Meyer. Story is produced without profit.

**Characters: **Leah/Jasper

**Status: **Completed one shot

**Rating: **K+

**Warnings: **Unapologetic fluff. Jasper/Leah romance.

**Inspirations:** Chocolate

**Summary: **It seemed the whole world was asleep except them, but it didn't matter anyway. Nothing else existed during moments like these. This was their time.

**…...**

**Melt**

**…...**

It seemed the whole world was asleep except them but it didn't matter anyway. Nothing else existed during moments like these. This was their time.

She picked up a chocolate truffle and glanced over at him. He was reading again. She sighed and stretched out, the chocolate melting on her tongue. She closed her eyes savouring the taste and it sent such a thrill through her that he looked over, eyebrow raised.

The moonlight reflected off his face. The effect was strange and beautiful. His features, carved of marble, were soft as he basked in her pleasure. She smiled and crept towards him. The bed was large but she could never be close enough. She laid her head upon his chest and looked up into his eyes.

"It was Belgian with a praline centre."

He didn't say anything, he simply smiled. His golden eyes glittered. He stroked her face tenderly, his cold fingers sending an entirely different thrill through her body.

She hitched her leg around his hip and buried her face in the crook of his neck. She heard a rumbling sigh deep in his chest as he rained kisses upon her hair.

"I love you," he whispered in a southern drawl. Heat settled in the pit of her stomach as the inflections of his perfect voice and his natural accent curled around her. She knew he felt it to and she smiled as he shifted uncomfortably underneath her.

"And I love you."

His subtle smile broke, shattered by a beaming grin and he pulled her closer. His arms felt like steel around her, as strong and just as cold but it didn't matter. In the end, he always made her melt.

…...


End file.
